Dexter by Design (Dexter 4)

f: “I loved Alex and you took him away …” So he would go after someone close to me. And by leaving the photo on Deutsch’s body, he had even told me who. It would be Cody and Astor, because that would hit me the same way I had hit him—and it would also bring me to him, and on his terms.

But how would he do it? That was the big question—and it seemed to me that the answer was fairly obvious. So far Weiss had been very straightforward—there is nothing terribly subtle about blowing up a house. I had to believe that he would move quickly, when he felt the odds favored him most. And since I knew he had been watching me, I had to assume he knew my daily routine—and the routine the children followed. They would be most vulnerable when Rita picked them up from school, coming out of a secure environment and into anything-goes Miami: I would be far away at work, and he could certainly overcome one relatively frail and unsuspecting woman to grab at least one of the kids.

So what I had to do was get into position first, before Weiss, and watch for him to arrive. It was a simple plan, and not without risk—I might well be wrong. But the Passenger was hissing agreement, and it is rarely wrong, so I resolved to leave work early, right after lunch, and get into position at the elementary school to intercept Weiss.

And once again, as I gathered myself for a great leap at the jugular vein of the impending foe—my telephone rang.

“Hey, buddy,” Kyle Chutsky said. “She’s awake, and she’s asking for you.”

TWENTY-FIVE

THEY HAD MOVED DEBORAH OUT OF THE INTENSIVE care unit. I had one moment of disjointed confusion when I stared into the empty ICU. I had seen this in a half-dozen movies, where the hero looks at the empty hospital bed and knows that it means whoever had been there is now dead, but I was quite sure Chutsky would have mentioned it if Debs had died, so I just went back down the hall to the reception area.

The woman at the desk made me wait while she did mysterious and very slow things with a computer, answered the phone, and talked with two of the nurses who were leaning nearby. The air of barely controlled panic that everyone had shown in the ICU was completely gone now, replaced by an apparently obsessive interest in phone calls and fingernails. But finally the woman admitted that there was a slim possibility of finding Deborah in room 235, which was on the second floor. That made so much sense I actually thanked her, and trudged off to find the room.

It was indeed on the second floor, and right next to room 233, so with a feeling that all was right with the world, I stepped in to see Deborah propped up in bed, with Chutsky on the far side of the bed in virtually the same position he had held in the ICU. There was still an impressive array of machinery surrounding Deborah, and the tubes still went in and out, but as I entered the room she opened one eye and looked at me, managing a modest half smile for my benefit.

“Alive, alive, oh,” I said, thinking that quaint good cheer was called for. I pulled a chair up beside the bed and sat.

“Dex,” she said in a soft and hoarse voice. She tried to smile again, but it was even worse than the first attempt, and she gave up and closed her eyes, seeming somehow to be receding into the snowy distance of the pillows.

“She’s not too strong here yet,” Chutsky said.

“I guessed that,” I said.

“So, uh, don’t get her tired, or anything. The doctor said.”

I don’t know if Chutsky thought I was going to suggest a game of volleyball, but I nodded and just patted Deborah’s hand. “It’s nice to have you back, sis,” I said. “You had us worried.”

“I feel,” she said in a feeble husky voice. But she did not tell us what she felt; instead, she closed her eyes again and parted her lips for a ragged breath, and Chutsky leaned forward and put a small chip of ice between her lips.

“Here,” he said. “Don’t try to talk yet.”

Debs swallowed the ice, but frowned at Chutsky anyway. “I’m okay,” she said, which was certainly a bit of an exaggeration. The ice seemed to help a little, and when she spoke again, her voice did not sound quite so much like a rat-tail file on an old doorknob. “Dexter,” she said, and the sound of it was unnaturally loud, as if she was shouting in church. She shook her head slightly and, to my great amazement, I saw a tear roll out of the corner of her eye—something I had not seen from her since she was twelve. It slid across her cheek and down onto the pillow, where it disappeared.

“Shit,” she said. “I feel so totally…” Her hand fluttered feebly, the one that Chutsky was not holding.

“You should,” I said. “You were practically dead.”

She lay there for a long moment, unspeaking, eyes closed, and then finally said, very softly, “I don’t want to do this anymore.”

I looked at Chutsky across Deborah; he shrugged. “Do what, Debs?” I said.

“Cops,” she said, and when I finally understood what she was saying, that she didn’t want to be a cop anymore, I was as shocked as if the moon had tried to resign.

“Deborah,” I said.

“Doesn’t make sense,” she said. “End up here … For what?” She opened her eyes and looked at me, and shook her head very slightly. “For what?” she said.

“It’s your job,” I said, and I admit it wasn’t terribly moving, but it was all I could think of under the circumstances, and I didn’t really think she wanted to hear about Truth, Justice, and the American Way.

She apparently didn’t want to hear that it was her job, either, because she just looked at me and then turned her head and closed her eyes again. “Shit,” she said.

“All right now,” said a loud and cheerful voice from the door, in a thick Bahamian accent. “Gentlemen must go.” I looked; a large and very happy nurse had come into the room and was advancing on us rapidly. “The lady must rest, which she cannot do when you are bothering her,” the nurse said. She said “boddering,” and for a second I found it so charming that I did not realize she was shooing me out.

“I just got here,” I said.

She planted herself right in front of me and crossed her arms. “Then you will save big money on parking, because you got to go now,” she said. “Come on, gentlemen,” she said, turning to face Chutsky. “Boat of you.”